Political Philosophy

There is another, more philosophically parochial, less method-
ologically explicit, way of making these points which owes some-
thing to Wittgenstein. Some claim that our understanding and
endorsement of central elements of our political life is likewise
built into the language we use to talk about them. Such language is
suffused with normativity, with a recognition of the requirements
made on us by the institutions we use such language to describe. If
we know what it means to talk about the state, authority, govern-
ment and the law, if we can play this particular set of language
games, we can see that asking, ‘Why can’t I break the law?’ is like
asking ‘Why can’t I move a rook along a diagonal?’ whilst playing
chess. Thus T. MacPherson insists that:

‘Why should I obey the government?’ is an absurd question. We

have not understood what it means to be a member of political

society if we suppose that political obligation is something that

we might not have had and that therefore needs to be justified.^25

In similar fashion, Hannah Pitkin argues that:

The same line of reasoning [as that adopted to dispose of the

question ‘Why should I keep a promise?’] can be applied to the

question ‘why does even a legitimate government, a valid law, a

genuine authority ever obligate me to obey?’ As with promises,

and as our new doctrine about political obligation suggests, we

may say that this is what ‘legitimate government’, ‘valid law’,

‘genuine authority’ mean. It is part of the concept, the meaning

of ‘authority’ that those subject to it are required to obey, that it

has a right to command. It is part of the concept, the meaning

of ‘law’, that those to whom it is applicable are obligated to obey

it. As with promises, so with authority, government, and law:

there is a prima facie obligation involved in each, and normally

you must perform it.^26

To be rude, we can recognize the Wittgensteinian tenor of the
argument when we hear the sound of the italics. These arguments
derive their plausibility from conceptual connections which are
evident enough: once we modify the nouns with the adjectives
‘legitimate’, ‘valid’ and ‘genuine’, ‘prima facie’ even, there is very

POLITICAL OBLIGATION